The More Than Toast Book Club

Books have always been a really important part of my life. When I was a kid I was a total bookworm and you’d always find me with my nose in a book: at the supermarket with my mum, in the library at school lunchtime, up late at night under the covers with a torch (yep, I was that kid). I love how you can completely lose yourself in a good story, no matter what’s happening in your life at that time.

I’ve found one of the down sides of becoming a parent is the lack of time, space and available light to read. If anyone out there knows the best way to spend half an hour with a book at 10pm without waking your lightly sleeping 5 month old then please come forward now: I’ve taken to reading on my Kindle iPhone app and really easy books at that (Cheryl Cole’s autobiography, ahem). And in all honesty, this is probably one of the reasons why I find my brain is turning to mush. That and the little person hanging off my ankle screeching “mummy, mummy, mummy, FART” ten thousand times a day.

When I made my Life List I thought that my love of literature should be a part of it. This is why I included the goal to read my way through a ‘Top 100’ list of books. And that’s one thing I’ve wanted to start accomplishing (the 5 month old will soon become six months old and will be ceremoniously moved to his own room). However, when it came to selecting the perfect top 100 list I became a bit stumped. The last list officially compiled by a newspaper over 4 years ago, and I want to include in my list more modern works. So I’ve decided to come up with my own.

Using a few ‘Top 100’ lists I found via Google (this one by The Telegraph, this one from the Guardian, The BBC’s Big Read and World Library’s Top 100) I have compiled the below books, but I want your help. I have 35 spaces left to fill and I need you to fill them! So what are your favourite, most thought changing and seminal books?

Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides (he of the Virgin Suicides)
The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
The Thursday Next series by Jasper Fforde
Most Alice HOffman books

There are too many wonderful books and not enough time. I find it really hard to focus on reading with a 2 month old and a 2 year old but I have just picked up Rebecca’s tale by Sally Beauman which, if you’ve read Rebecca, is surprisingly good.

I would add The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven by Sherman Alexie, something by Ernest Hemingway, The Secret History by Donna Tartt, Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters, and the Regeneration trilogy by Pat Barker. And probably loads more that I can’t think of right now!

My favourites include The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera and Sophie’s World by Jostein Gaarder.
I’m just re-reading Human Traces by Sebastian Faulks and have just finished the fabulous Any Human Heart by William Boyd.

Oh god The Grapes of Wrath made me weep. All time favourites- Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey, The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera, The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje, Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut… Oh and lots more!! If you don’t want more mush for brains maybe leave out The Da Vinci Code & 50 Shades?! Ha.

Ah I’m trying to compile a list of books I want to read, there are so many!! Since becoming a parent I found short stories are good as its just enough to keep my brain working without the having the dedication of a novel. (I can usually finish one story before I drift off) my favourite collections of short stories are … What we talk about when we talk about love/ Elepant/Cathredral all by Raymond Carver. Fine just the way it is, Annie Proulx and Collected stories by John Cheever oh also check out Lorrie Moore.. Also for a bit of family disfuction The Corrections by Johnathan Frazon is my all time favourite novel!

Ah I’m trying to compile a list of books I want to read, there are so many!! Since becoming a parent I found short stories are good as its just enough to keep my brain working without the having the dedication of a novel. (I can usually finish one story before I drift off) my favourite collections of short stories are … What we talk about when we talk about love/ Elepant/Cathredral all by Raymond Carver. Fine just the way it is, Annie Proulx and Collected stories by John Cheever oh also check out Lorrie Moore.. Also for a bit of family disfuction The Corrections by Jonathan Frazen is my all time favourite novel!

Forgive me if I’m repeating things – I did read the list but I forget things! Some of my very favourites ever:

A Prayer for Owen Meany – John Irving
Middlesex – Jeffrey Eugenides
I Capture the Castle – Dodie Smith
Good Omens – Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman
The Crow Road – Iain Banks
The Secret History – Donna Tartt
The Name of the Wind (this is the first in a trilogy – the last is still to be released) – Patrick Rothfuss
When You Reach Me – Rebecca Stead

After six months of reading nothing but nonsense interspersed with the joy that is Rothfuss, I decided to try and read Wolf Hall. I usually read really fast, but toddlers and reading do not mix, and then when she’s in bed I’m too tired to do anything but watch MasterChef Australia (if anyone spoils it for me, they will DIE). Ramona’s in her own room now of course, but I’m really tempted to get a Kindle Paperwhite so that I can read in bed without waking Ashley!

Wow, what an inspiring list! I may do this alongside you too!
I would add Wild Swans by Jung Chang which is my favourite ever book and A Thousand Splendid Suns which is the follow up to The Kite Runner.
Can’t wait to see your final 100!
Hannah x

You have some nice ones on there-a few of my favourites are getting a look in. I’d also recommend adding
The grapes of wrath,
The Night Circus,
The Book Thief,
A Fine Balance,
A heartbreaking work of staggering genius,
American Pastoral and
Sophie’s World.
And definitely skip the Da Vinci Code-seriously one of the worst books I have ever read!!

Not sure if you could call this a classic, but a book I absolutely adore is The End of Mr Y by Scarlett Thomas. It’s smart, readable, slightly weird fiction. Don’t let the kiddy-style cover put you off.

Very glad to see you have Brave New World on the list as well. That would be my number one. I’ve re-read it a bunch of times and always force it on people as a present.

Some of my favourites are The Hitch Hikers Guide To The Galaxy (my favourite books of all time), A Beginners Guide To Acting English by Shappi Khorsandi, Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell, The Shadow Of The Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon, and the His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman. Any anything by Terry Pratchett!

Nice to see some of my favourites on here – I must be doing something right with my reading!! Some of my suggestions would be:
? I Don’t Know How She Does It – Allison Pearson
? PS. I love you – Cecilia Ahern
? Where Rainbows End – Cecilia Ahern
? Once in a Lifetime – Cathy Kelly
? Noughts and Crosses series – Malorie Blackman
? The Chronicles of Narnia – C.S Lewis
? At least 3 books from the Discworld Series!!!! – Sir Terry Pratchett
? His Dark Materials – Philip Pullman

Another vote for One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. If you are looking to add in some Dickens, David Copperfield is my favourite, but it’s LONG. And a book that I come back to time and time again is The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver – definitely recommend this one.

I did this a few years ago my New Year’s resolution was 100 books in a year (I was spending 3 hours travelling to and from work so it was achievable then!)
I ones that really have stayed with me, and I find myself thinking about a lot are:

1. Graham Greene – The End of the Affair
2. Hangover Square – Patrick Hamilton
3. Room at the Top – John Braine
4. Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky – Patrick Hamilton
5. The Wayward Bus – John Steinbeck
6. Decline and Fall – Evelyn Waugh
7. For Esme with Love and Squalor – J.D. Salinger
8. Down and Out in Paris and London – George Orwell
9. Three Men in New Suits – J.B. Priestley
10. The Slaves of Solitude – Patrick Hamilton

Not exactly a list of feel good reads, but they are all incredible! Keep us posted on how you get on x

I hope you enjoy reading it, as much as I did. I managed it, thanks to my work being right by an Oxfam Bookshop (49p for a novel!) Quite a few of the plots got jumbled up… perhaps it was just too much information for me to take in! x

You already have the one that I tell everyone to read: – The Book Thief by Markus Zusak.

I have to recommend some Neil Gaiman, but it’s tricky to get the right one to start. I’d probably say The Graveyard Book which sort of sits between adult and children’s fiction. And on the same basis recommend the Tiffany Aching series from Terry Pratchett, starting with the Wee Free Men. then if you like that you can explore more Discworld novels.

Classics:
The Great Gatsby – F Scott Fitzgerald
Ethan Frome – Edith Wharton
David Copperfield/Great Expectations – Dickens
1984 – George Orwell
And if you have room for another Jane Austen, can I persuade you to Persuasion?

Some great books on here. Now I know where to go when I’m seeking some reading inspiration. You have plenty to keep you going but I must suggest a beautiful book that remains one of my favs – The Glass Castle, by Jeannette Walls. Oh, and then there’s always the Hunger Games series. I flew through the 3 books in a week…

In my teens I read a book that, to this day, has been the one that most backed up/changed my view about the feminism movement (we are talking about the 70s). At the time it was a seminal work – the first best seller on the subject – so I am very surprised not to see it here (although as a father in my 50s, I am not quite your demographic). Maybe the view of marriage depicted is seen today as too bleak, maybe it was just a book for its time, but I reckon it is still worth a read. The book? The Women’s Room by Marilyn French.